


Where I Can't Follow

by Istrael, Sasskarian



Category: Ancient Greek Religion & Lore, The Witcher (TV)
Genre: Inspired by Hades and Persephone (Ancient Greek Religion & Lore), Inspired by Orpheus and Eurydice (Ancient Greek Religion & Lore), Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-25
Updated: 2020-02-07
Packaged: 2021-02-27 07:07:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 9
Words: 10,958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22403137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Istrael/pseuds/Istrael, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sasskarian/pseuds/Sasskarian
Summary: Geralt of Rivia has died. Jaskier is not evenslightlyon board with this turn of events, and there shall be no peace and quiet foranyone,Oh Valley of Plenty, until Yennefer helps himfix this right now.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia & Jaskier | Dandelion, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg
Comments: 24
Kudos: 94





	1. Prologue: Kakophonia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kakophonia: a great unpleasant noise, cacophony
> 
> Credits for source material: The Witcher franchise creators, and the great Greek and Roman writers  
> Credit for premise: voidofthestars on tumblr (link to be found at the end of the work)  
> Credit for beta-reading: sanderidge

The first time Geralt of Rivia dies, he hears the whistle of the sword which almost kills him. There’s a series of tiny holes stamped along the spine of the blade, keeping weight down and adding a sinister shrill hiss through the air on each pass. The raiding party - if it can be dignified with such language - are nearly all armed with similar steel, with hunting horns, rattling chime-spangled shields, and bullroarer slings wailing and droning like an oncoming swarm of giant wasps. The effect is deafening, overpowering all efforts to coordinate the various companies on this mission.

Geralt came this way, Jaskier and Yennefer and Ciri all in tow, expecting a fairly straightforward Manticore hunt. The three adults had exchanged a concerned look over Ciri’s head, when they approached the hunt’s base camp and saw how many were gathered to participate. It only took an hour of careful listening, to discern that the hunt was a front being used by the local Duke to station mercenary companies on his most threatened border. 

Then it turned out the Duke was an old friend of Yennefer’s, and Jaskier wanted to collect a story while he was there, and Ciri was too tired to keep walking all the way back to the nearest town out of harm’s way. So they stayed, of course, and Geralt made sure to glower about it every chance he got.

It didn’t simplify matters one bit that there actually was a Manticore, which spent the first night picking off mercenaries who’d pitched their tents too far from the bright lights in the center of camp. Geralt made short work of it and was walking back to Yennefer’s magic tent, when the Clamour set upon them. 

That’s what the border skirmishers were called by the locals, for their noise-based shock tactics. They weren’t so much a raiding party as a twelve-man walking massacre, wading through the encamped mercenaries with casual ease. They were some manner of infectious undead, and for every body they cut down, one rose up, crashing sword pommel against shield to add to the din.

So it is that Geralt, Yennefer, Jaskier, and Ciri find themselves surrounded at dawn, guarding each other’s backs with the child in the middle atop Roach, and when Yennefer’s chaotic gouts of flame pause for an instant, the undead break through the line of fire that had been keeping them out. They are overrun.

Then the Clamour fall as one, like puppets with cut strings.

Geralt and Jaskier turn toward each other and make eye contact for a moment, before glancing down together at the fountain of gore sluggishly sliding out of Geralt’s stomach. No sound is loud enough to compete with Cirilla’s siren-shriek. This is why, the first time Geralt of Rivia dies, he hears nothing at all from the sword which, instead of killing Jaskier, kills him.


	2. Chapter 1: Lysis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lysis: Plato's dialogue debating the nature of friendship and loyalty, and what is essential to each

“Geralt, get up. Come on, open your eyes. You’re going to upset Roach if you keep this up, and she’ll bite me. You _know_ you aren’t allowed to be dead, because Yennefer didn’t give you permission, and neither did the Princess, and I’m pretty sure they both outrank you.” Jaskier weakly smacks Geralt’s face, where the large man lays crumpled on the earth, while Yennefer stands some distance away, blocking Cirilla’s view with her body.

“No, I _know_ they both outrank you. You don’t get a vote, because you’re not waking up, you stubborn ass, so it’s three against one. Make that four; Roach definitely votes that you definitely aren’t allowed to be dead. It’s not a good look on you.” The steady stream of verbal diarrhea won’t seem to stop, and Jaskier’s face is wet and slimy, and he doesn’t want to think very hard about how little of that slime is just tears and snot. 

“And to top it all off, you’re making _me_ look bad, talking to a corpse right after a bunch of noisy corpses just tried to gut me, and they-” Jaskier shudders violently. “They gutted you instead of me. You got in the way of that sword, when it was aiming for me. Why did you _do_ that? Don’t you know I’m too young to be in charge of a whole entire _horse_? And don’t even get me started about Ciri and Yen; no, this is _unreasonable_ amounts of responsibility, and I will _not_ stand for it! You have left me in the lurch without so much as alimony! You know this is really rather difficult without you ‘hmm-ing’ at me; you keep missing your lines. Anyone who thinks you’re quiet normally has never had to rant one-sidedly at you without your ‘hmms.’” Jaskier stands up and marches over to Yennefer, who looks up at him with teary eyes.

“Are you quite done?” Yennefer demands, glancing down pointedly at the distraught child clutching the front of her gown. 

“I am _not_ quite done,” Jaskier huffs. “We’re going to fix this. We’re bringing him back.”

Ciri looks up at that. 

“C-can… you do… that?” Her voice is scraped raw from using her power, or perhaps from crying; Jaskier makes a mental note to get her some tea with honey when they’re back at the tavern later.

“Obviously,” Jaskier scoffs, at the exact same time as Yennefer says, “No.”

Yennefer cuts in, “NO, absolutely _not_. Death is final for everyone. It’s the point at which all lives and timelines converge; there’s no moving away from it, only toward it.”

“Well, thankfully I disagree. Someone among us ought to have that much good sense,” Jaskier replies. “Now start wracking that terribly clever brain of yours, and I’ll do the same, and between your sorcery and my encyclopedic knowledge of myths and legends, we’ll figure out some way to bring him back, because what is _not_ happening today, is Geralt of Rivia dying and staying dead, over one _stupid sword_ in the hands of a _stupid murderous skeleton_ , that was aiming for a _stupid bard’s stupid guts, in the first place!_ ” Jaskier’s voice rises to a hysterical pitch, and he drops to his knees next to Geralt, sobbing frantically.


	3. Chapter 2: Pathos, Ethos, Logos

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The three modes of persuasion, as described by Plato:  
> Pathos - Appeal to emotion and sentiment  
> Ethos - Appeal to character and ethics  
> Logos - Appeal to reason and good sense

Yennefer turns her back on Jaskier. She nearly starts walking away. Only two things stop her.

First, Jaskier will follow Geralt anywhere, anywhen, through anything. This has been the uninterrupted axiom encapsulating all that she knows of Jaskier, through both observation and what little Geralt could be wheedled to admit (gruffly, reluctantly, after a few pints).

Second, she hears Jaskier ranting again, incensed, at Geralt’s corpse. 

“Do you have any idea how much I hate funerals, Geralt? Oh god, I’m going to have to purchase _floral arrangements._ What kind of flowers do they arrange for Witcher funerals - wild onions? Do Witchers even get funerals? Maybe if we plant you in the ground for three days, you’ll spring up, good as new. Couldn’t hurt the _smell_ , I can tell you that.”

_Sometimes a flower is just a flower, and the best thing it can do for us is to die._

Tissaia’s words chime through Yennefer’s head, and she thinks, _all we need is a big enough flower, and the Dandelion himself is volunteering._

“I have an idea.”

“Good!” Jaskier yelps, hopping up onto his feet again and bounding over to Yennefer, reminding Yennefer far too much of a puppy. The puppy who follows Geralt everywhere. 

“I’ll probably have to stab you.”

“Not good!” Jaskier yelps again, dodging backward with an arm protectively across his abdomen.

Yennefer waves a hand carelessly. 

“Only a little,” she amends, which doesn’t appear to be changing his mind one bit about the relative goodness of stabbing. “And not here, Buttercup. We have to get his body as far from other dead things as possible, because we’ll only have one shot, and if we accidentally resurrect the wrong person…” she spreads her hands, indicating the corpses heaped in all directions. “Well, not all of these are friendlies, and most of them I wouldn’t mind killing twice, but it does rather defeat the purpose of the exercise. Now help me carry him, and make sure we don’t leave any pieces behind. Ciri, don’t watch.” 

Jaskier doesn’t see where Yennefer reaches to produce a large waxed canvas tarp, but he’s duly impressed by how well she maneuvers a corpse without getting anything on her unreasonably lavish gown. His own doublet is a mess of gore and worse things than gore, and he scowls down at Geralt.

“You are going to owe me a new livery. No, _five_ new liveries. And possibly a _liver_ , after I’m done drinking all the wine which you will _also_ owe me.”

After depositing Ciri and Roach in the custody of the Duke, to get cleaned up and stay safe until they return, Yennefer opens a portal which spits the two and their gruesome cargo onto a barren crag of shattered black glass. Jaskier pukes for the fourth time in as many hours. 

“Right,” Yennefer announces, “we’re headed that way.” She points toward a distant shard on the horizon, spouting blue-violet gouts of flame, which Jaskier belatedly (nauseously) recognises, mostly from the reek of sulfur and the heat in the air, as a volcano. Or something like a volcano.


	4. Chapter 3: Ananke

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ananke: Fate, Destiny, necessity, inevitability

“Where exactly _are_ we?” Jaskier asks for the sixth time in two hours of picking their way carefully across the obsidian scree covering the long, shallow slope of the volcano’s foot. Geralt’s tarp-wrapped body feels heavier by the moment, and Jaskier begins to feel grateful for the brimstone odor, as he’s quite certain the corpse must be starting to smell by now. Almost every time he thinks of their insane journey and the weight between them, his mind course-corrects from ‘Geralt’ to ‘the corpse.’ This empty shell they carry is _not_ Geralt; whether it was once Geralt is more debatable, but that line of thought makes him sick, so he shoos it away at every chance. 

“We are in a land where one does not simply walk in, at one’s pleasure.” Every time she had answered, the phrasing was a bit different, like Yennefer was adamantly avoiding repeating herself or giving this place anything that might be mistaken for a name.

“Yes, I get that - I have the bleeding ankles to prove it; damn these shards - but where does this place happen to be? And why is the fire blue?”

“We are in a place where the pull of death is weakest, of all the places in the world.”

“Ah, so that’s why everything on this blasted terrain is made of sharp edges and fire and horrible toxic fumes? Because death’s pull here is _weak_?”

“You have cause and effect reversed. Death is weaker here, because there is no life here except what we bring in with us.”

“I don’t know; that looks rather alive to me.” Jaskier points up as they crest the top of the volcano, where in the midst of the dancing blue flames and wafting black smoke, they can both plainly see a single stout pomegranate tree, in full spring bloom, untouched by the heat and appearing to rise up from somewhere beneath the magma, for its lower trunk cannot be seen past the fire and smoke. “For that matter, we look rather alive to me. Why aren’t we burning up, this close?”

“Looks are misleading,” Yennefer replies without elaboration. “And I’ve been warding us against the heat and fumes. That’s why you’re along; I can’t carry his body by myself, and protect us at the same time. Come on; we’re almost there. The easy part’s over.” She carefully lowers Geralt on a shelf of stone near the lip of the volcano, and Jaskier’s grip slips, making him clumsily drop Geralt’s feet with a thud. 

“If that was the easy part, what’s the hard part?” Jaskier asks. Yennefer points at the blooming tree.

“I’m going to need you to walk over there and bring me back blossoms from that tree.”

Jaskier looks out over the magma and sees no way across. He gulps.

“Alright. How do I do that?”

“The same way you aren’t already a cinder right now. You walk across. Magma is stone melted into a liquid. Stone is heavier than you are. You can literally just tread upon it. Hop down, jog across, bring back a branch the size of your hand with as many flowers on it as you can manage, and make your way back. I’ll ward you the whole way and pull you back up when you get to this side.” 

Jaskier nods decisively. Nods again. “Sure. That seems. Reasonable. One question. Why am I doing this?”

“You’re the only one who can. Geralt’s death bought you another day of living. The Sovereign Tree only permits the touch of one whose death came for him but accepted another life instead. It straddles the border between mortality and death, refusing to fully exist on either side. It only truly exists for those who themselves have one foot through death’s door, and only by a dual stroke of mercy and Destiny, remain walking and breathing. My hand would probably pass right through its wood. Nobody’s…” she trails off. 

“What?”

“Nobody’s ever made the choice to protect me like that. Not me _alone_. Some have died so I could continue protecting a cause they championed, but that meant it was lives other than mine, that they were saving, and I was just the means to that end. So it has to be you. Pluck a spray off the tree, and bring it back to me. Taking it away from the fire will force it to exist in the living world for a little while.”

“Right. You’re _sure_ I can just walk down there?”

Yennefer grabs a piece of obsidian and throws it down into the maw. To Jaskier’s simultaneous relief and dismay, it makes a dull _clunk,_ rather than a wet splash. 

“That answers that." He tries for a smile but from the neutrality-bordering-on-impatience of Yen’s face, it’s not his best. "Off I go, then.”


	5. Chapter 4: Laches

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Laches: Plato's discourse on the nature of courage

“You can do this,” Jaskier tells himself. “You can. It’s just… you know, magma.” 

He looks back at Yennefer; her form is wavery through the thick wall of heat coming off the caldera, but even so, the impatient motion of get on with it, bard, is clear enough. He takes a deep, sulfur-scented breath and steps out off the solid rock into the sluggish churn of the molten. To his surprise, his foot _plonks_ on the surface and, though it shifts in the most gut-clenching way, it bears his weight. 

The second step he takes is almost startled out of him, more a follow-through of the first than a separate decision. Yen’s spellwork is, as usual, almost insultingly perfect-- not that he _wants_ to burn to a cinder, thank you very much, it’s just that magic isn’t really his forte and Yen has tried to kill him at least twice. And wants to stab him again, gods help him. 

The closer and closer Jaskier gets to his goal, the louder and louder his pulse pounds in his ears, until he nearly can’t hear anything else, not even the guttural bubbling and hissing of the volcano surrounding him. By the time he reaches the tree, his knees are shaking so hard they’re almost knocking against one another. When he curls a hand around the lowest branch, trying to convince his lungs that they can, in fact, still breathe, the knuckles are clenched bloodless and the cords of his arm show through the various patches of wear in his sleeve. 

As his hand touches the scaly bark, Jaskier’s heart is leaping up to his throat. _That’s how I’ll describe it later, in a ballad: heart leaping up throat. Perfectly grisly idea. Hard to rhyme, though. Throat, boat, goat, stoat, mote… moat! ‘His heart lept in his throat / as he crossed the magma moat,’ yes that’s rather good- oh dear._

Jaskier’s musings are interrupted by the realisation that the heart-leaping sensation is more literal than initially believed. He sucks in a shaky breath, hand still wrapped around the branch he selected, and is aghast to realise the tree feels like it’s alive. _No, of course it’s alive; trees are alive. Or half-alive, that’s what Yen said. It feels like it has a heartbeat, that’s what it feels like._ He plugs one ear with his free hand, listening. _It feels like it has my heartbeat. Nope, nopenope. The less I think about that, the better._ He realises he’s chanting rhythmically to himself, as though substituting the now-absent thudding of his heart, which had been so loud on the walk to the Sovereign Tree.

“Get the branch, get back to Yen. Get the branch, get back to Yen.” The branch in his hand pulses steadily, and the rhythm of his chanting matches it beat for beat. His walk turns into a jog, which turns into a stumbling run. He manages not to fall when he trips on an upwelling of the magma, mostly by falling into the sidewall of the caldera and being bodily hauled out of it by Yennefer, who continues to be _beastly strong_ for her size. Jaskier momentarily wonders if she could have carried Geralt on her own, all along, but his train of thought is interrupted again by the _branch with a heartbeat, his heartbeat, in his hand, and oh god it’s bleeding._

“Oh god, it’s bleeding.”

“That happens, yes,” Yennefer replies drily, taking the branch out of his hand. “It’s solid. Good work.”

“Why is it bleeding? Also you mentioned stabbing. And I think it- my hear-”

“Your heartbeat was pulled into the tree, yes, that’s expected. And that’s sap, not blood, though you can taste-test it, if you don’t believe me.” Yennefer waves the dripping cut end of the branch in Jaskier’s face, and he reels away from it.

“No, I’ll take your word. I’m feeling very credulous today. Why does it have my heartbeat, exactly? Am I going to get it _back_? Also, is it supposed to be whispering? I’m definitely hearing whispers coming from it, and they’re getting louder.”

“Would you rather the comforting answer or the true answer?” 

Jaskier hesitates. “It is unusual for you to offer such a thing. Mark me concerned… but true answer.”

“Bringing a piece of the Sovereign Tree fully into Life means leaving a half-portion of your own Life inside it, and sending half of yourself into Death. The whispers you’re hearing are from those who are already on the other side.”

“Alright. That’s not comforting; you’re right. Why have you sent me to become halfway dead, exactly?”

“Because if you go into the land of the dead with your entire Life inside your body, you just die completely, and you can’t come back out. With half of it here on the outside, your Life calls to itself, and you’ll be able to find your way back.”

“And the stabbing? You said only a _little_ stabbing. Was that a joke?”

“Not a joke.” Faster than Jaskier can react, Yennefer produces a paring knife and jabs him shallowly in the shoulder, then smears the blood on the leaves of the branch. “That’s to make sure you come back with a body, and not as a disembodied spirit.” She crouches down and swipes the branch against the Corpse Formerly Known As Geralt. “Him, too.” 

Then Yennefer stands up and unceremoniously shoves Geralt into the volcano with her foot. 

“WHY would you DO that?!” Jaskier attempts to dive after the corpse, but is yanked backward by Yennefer’s _alarmingly strong_ grasp on his shirt collar. He’s especially bothered by the fact he didn’t hear the body _land_ on anything.

“Look, Buttercup, if we resurrect him into a body that has its insides on the outside, he’ll be none too pleased with us. That’s what will happen if his body is still here on this side of the divide between Life and Death.”

“Oh.”

“Yes.”

“That’s unpleasant.” Jaskier is beginning to feel his talents for understatement have been honed his entire life, for this very moment.

“Extremely. And he’d die again on the spot, wasting our efforts."

“So we’re not going to do that. Right."

"I should warn you, though; even if we do everything perfectly, he might come back as something dark and unnatural.”

"Dark and un-" Jaskier sputters. "Geralt is _already_ dark and unnatural. As long as he comes back with a pulse, I'm happy. What happens next?”

“Next, I climb down this mountain alone, moving to a safe distance, and I start working on a portal to bring you and Geralt back.”

“Yennefer, I must confess, you’re worrying me with this talk of ‘finding my way out’ and ‘bringing me back.’ What happens to _me_ next?”

“Well, the part you’re worried about has already happened, and I’ve already explained it to you. You’re half-alive and half-dead. You’re in the one place in the world where that can be true, and you can still walk around, talking and breathing. The moment you step off this mountain, ‘half-alive’ becomes ‘completely dead.’ The only way forward for you is through.”

“Which means…”

“Which means I am going to go create, painstakingly, with my terribly clever brain and my sorcery, a door for you to exit… and you, with your encyclopedic knowledge of myths and legends, are going to go into the Otherworld, find Geralt, and make your way together to the door.” Yennefer pulls a blossom off the branch and tucks it behind Jaskier’s ear. “It won’t last very long, since it’s alive, but we’ll be able to communicate for a little while, before the uneven flow of time disrupts the connection. Now, off you go.” Yennefer gives Jaskier a firm shove, and he finds himself falling into the caldera, but instead of landing hard on the firm, undulating surface of magma, he keeps falling.


	6. Chapter 5: Katabasis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Katabasis: A descent into the Underworld

_“Now, before you do anything else, tell me what you already know about the Otherworld.”_ Yennefer’s voice is tinny, emerging from the flower on his ear.

“I d-”

_“Nonsense. What do myths say? What are the rules? The taboos.”_

“Um. Don’t eat anything.”

_“Correct. What else?”_

“Don’t drink the water. Don’t make promises to the dead. Be polite but don’t apologise or thank them for anything. Have a coin on your person. Don’t look behind you, on your way out.”

_“All correct, though I hadn’t heard the one about thanking, so you’re already doing better than I would. More.”_

“Don’t expect time to move the same speed. It’s moving faster on one side, though I won’t know which.”

_“Right; it’s not consistent. Here’s another: mortal wounds sustained while you are there will not persist once you emerge, and they won’t kill you while you’re there, as long as you don’t waste too much time. You aren’t bringing enough life in with you, for death’s pull on you to be strong. You can still be incapacitated, which is far more dangerous. I’ll know if you fail in your mission, because the flowers will stop counting your heartbeats.”_

“What will you do if that happens?”

_“Die, probably. Nobody’s ever survived attempting this before, though the theory is well understood.”_

“Ah. So what you’re saying is, you aren’t one-sidedly sacrificing me?”

_“Don’t flatter yourself, Jaskier. I’m absolutely sacrificing you. I’m just confident I can bring you back faster than it can kill me, too, and if I’m not, then you have the cold comfort of knowing you won’t die alone.”_ Yennefer pauses and offers Jaskier a grim smile that he can hear clearly through the pomegranate blossom. _“That was going to be the comforting answer, by the way: you’re technically dying, for your part, but you’re not dead, and I can get you back.”_

“You have a funny notion of what’s comforting, madam. I find it interesting that you waited to tell me all this until after I got down here. What about the Princess?”

_“She’s safe with the Duke, and my mentor will check in on her at least weekly. If I know anything at all about Tissaia de Vries,” Yennefer huffs a rueful laugh, “she’ll adopt Cirilla the moment she’s certain we’re not coming back, and she’ll pass it off as merely giving her a proper education. As for not telling you earlier that my life is in danger, too… you’re right. I wasn’t certain you’d agree to it if you knew it might kill me.”_

“Why not? Do you think you’re more important to me than Geralt is?”

_“Not at all. I _know_ you believe I’m more important to Geralt than you are, though. I think you’d hesitate to risk my life, if there’s any chance of him hearing about it and not forgiving you later.”_

“Well, then it seems you’ve thought of everything. Everything except how _bloody dark it is down here._ How am I supposed to get around?” Her remarks sting, but in his heart he knows she’s telling the tr-

_”You’re wrong, you know.”_

“Sorry, _what?_ OW.” Jaskier hits his head on something firm and wet. Reaching up a hand blindly, he finds something firm dangling from the ceiling. It reminds him of the texture of parsnips, but woodier.

_”Oh, right, watch out for the roots. You’re wrong, I said. I’m not more important to Geralt than you are. He’s going to be furious with me, no matter how this ends, but it wouldn’t even occur to him to be angry at you for trying to bring him back, except that you’re risking your own life for him when he just died to save you. Even if it kills me, he’s only going to truly blame me, because he’s going to be convinced this entire scheme and all its risks are my idea.”_

“Why would he do that? I’m the one who insisted we bring him back. And how am I supposed to watch out for anything when I can’t see? There’s no light.”

_”Ghosts emit light; find one. As to Geralt, first, because this actually was my idea. Second, because you aren’t a wizard, so you wouldn’t have the knowledge or skill to even have this idea. Third, because I dragged you along, instead of finding someone more expendable to Geralt. He’ll be right to be mad at me.”_

“Well, don’t sound _too_ excited about it. Oh, there’s a ghost! Hello, there; would you mind- a moment- no, don’t wander off, I need- ugh, _rude!_ Anyway, it’s getting hard to hear you over the whispers. I think your talking flower is dying.”

_I hope not quite yet,_ Yennefer thinks. She says, _“Alright. It’s up to you now. He shouldn’t be hard to find; he’s put a lot of beings down there, after all, so they’ll have heard of him. Do what you do best, and make some distracting noises until someone helps you.”_

The pomegranate flower falls silent and withers away into dust, making Jaskier sneeze several times. A dozen eerie blue-green ghostlights flicker up around him, emitting menacing whispers which range from inquisitive to annoyed to bored. Jaskier looks down and startles violently. At first he thinks he’s standing in a pool of blood. Then he hears dripping sounds, and looking up he realises the blood is falling from the cave ceiling’s… stalactites? Bones? _Roots. Yen said watch out for the roots._ Stark white, longer than he is tall, thicker than a man’s arm, are thousands of tree roots dripping thick red sap to the cave floor. It pools in depressions in the floor, trickles in shallow rivulets down the equally red walls, and in a few places it has congealed into solid amber stalagmites on the ground, just tall enough to bark Jaskier’s shins. 

To Jaskier’s relief, none of it _smells_ anywhere near as bad as it looks: musty, a bit floral, but nothing like the gore he left behind on the field where Geralt was slain. That doesn’t save him from the distinct impression that he’s inside an enormous fossilised heart, of course, and the mental image only gets stronger by the minute, as he inches his way forward through pitch-darkness, then strides faster when ghosts drift by to light the way.

As Jaskier scoots along, often resorting to clinging to the cave wall despite how sticky, slimy, and generally horrible it is, he contemplates his condition, and contemplation turns into muttering aloud to himself, in a desperate effort to counter the loudness of whispering ghosts around him. 

“I don't do fear well. Or bravery or, as Yen likes to put it, common sense, either. But definitely not fear. And having been thrown into a volcano by Yen - which, _thanks, Yen,_ that's in no way terrifying - is worthy of some fear. You ghosts really aren’t helping, you know; is this how everyone winds up? Is this what I have to look forward to? Being a creepy blue will-o-the-whispers, in a creepy red cave with a drippy bleeding tree knocking my head and knees everywhere I turn? Do ghosts even _have_ knees? I never thought I’d be grateful to have knees, or worried about not having them. Good lord, will you lot STOP WHISPERING ALREADY?!” He ends on a shout, and thousands of ghosts flare to full brightness all around him, giving him a clear view of a cavern many times larger than the tunnel he’s just exited. He can acutely feel the attention of every last one of them, particularly because the cavern - which is still echoing from his shout - is otherwise completely silent.

“Oh. Erm, please pardon my rudeness; I’m terribly out of sorts, you see. I don’t come this way often, and I… wasn’t… expecting… such a reception?” He trails off as the ghosts drift toward him, pressing close around him until he can’t take a step forward without passing through one of them.

Jaskier immediately regrets stepping through a ghost, his skin crawling from head to toe, and he resolves to try to never ever do that again, if he can just get past this particular crowd. 

_They’re a crowd. I can work a crowd. Distracting noises until I find help, Yennefer says. I can make distracting noises._

So Jaskier deals with fear the same way he does with anything else: he talks, and talking turns into singing. He's well acquainted with the sound of his own voice cracking - _again, thanks Yen_ \- by now, and all its various pitches of "Oh Gods I'm going to die." But it's not like he became a bard because he was good at staying mum. Words and voice are his power, his strength. It's why Geralt lets him follow, albeit with what Jaskier likes to think of as affectionate eye rolling. It's what draws laughter from Cirilla after a long day of Witchering - _Witching? What's the verb form of 'Witcher?'_ He makes a note to ask Geralt as soon as they fix this mess - and entices Yen to sit nearer to them, like a half-feral cat lured by the promise of tolerable company.

And now it’s ghosts he’s luring, ghosts who are parting like water around him. His lute is in his hands, and he doesn’t remember reaching for it, or bringing it down here. Or bringing it all the way out to the volcano, for that matter. His hands were too full hauling Ger- _the corpse. Hauling the corpse._ Well, he has a lute regardless, so he’s playing it, and it seems to be getting good feedback. The whispers haven’t started back up again, so he tries his luck.

He asks for directions.

_When a humble bard seeks a certain ghost,  
he might request some help from his host.  
I fell from above, sent to find a friend,  
a legend, a Witcher, true to the end.  
Please show me to Geralt, oh cavern of ghosties, oh cavern of ghosties!  
I’m looking for Geralt, oh cavern of ghosties!_

The whispers start up as he ends the chorus, and now they start sounding properly like words.

“We know no Geralt.”  
“Give us more songs.”  
“We hunger for a story. There are no stories in the land of the dead.”  
“Tell us more. Our stories have ended. We want more.”

“Well,” Jaskier thinks fast, “if I tell you more about him, maybe you will recognise him by reputation?”

“Perhaps.”  
“Could be. Sing more.”  
“Give us another verse, bard.”

So Jaskier resumes playing.

_Geralt, bold and brave, fought the vermin back;  
His eyes were both yellow, his livery black.  
He killed Manticores, and undead monsters, too,  
But maybe if you’re dead, that won’t mean much to you.  
I’m seeking the Witcher, a friend of the living, a friend of the living, oh!  
He rescued a dragon, the Witcher likes dragons, and most of the living!_

_Might somebody know  
Which way I should go  
To find my friend Geralt,  
His hair like dingy snow?_

_Someone point the way;  
I haven’t got all day.  
I want my best friend back,  
Now what do you say?_

“I know your Witcher, bard. Come closer.” A woman’s clear voice cuts through the darkness, and Jaskier jogs over, still strumming open chords. He finds a pale woman with dark hair, seated - no, _embedded_ in the wall, in a seated position, with the Sovereign Tree’s roots wrapped around her body so tightly she can’t move anything but her mouth to speak, and her eyes, which are - even in this low light - bottomless pools of blackness.

“Free me from these roots imprisoning me, and I will take you to Geralt of Rivia.”

Jaskier hurriedly begins prying at the roots binding the woman, and he’s surprised to find they come away easily in his hands. 

“Why do they move for me, and not you? Am I making a huge mistake by freeing you?”

“Not at all,” the woman replies. “You have a bit of life about you, and the Tree responds to that. I don’t, so it reacts to me the way it would react to any other unliving thing. I simply picked the wrong place to sit down. Other than you, we’re all dead down here, and present no meaningful danger to one another. Even if I were dangerous, where would I escape to?” 

“You must realise, of course, that this is something a dangerous person would say, to talk a bard into helping her escape.”

“And yet here you are, helping me. Funny how that works out, isn’t it?”

“Well, it’s not exactly like this is the stupidest thing I’ve done all day. I’m _here_ , after all." _I’ve known this person all of three minutes, and she’s already more pleasant than Yennefer. Say, this counts as the third time Yennefer has tried to kill me! Oh, the nerve._

He notices he’s more annoyed now than frightened, and he suspects it’s because there’s someone dangerous nearby who isn’t trying to kill him. _Damn, Geralt, you may have awakened something in me._

“There you are, then. Which way to the Witcher? And I didn’t catch your name, Miss…” 

“Princess, actually, but I agree with what you said about the wrong sort of attention. You can call me Renfri.” 


	7. Chapter 6: Sphinx

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sphinx: a gate guardian monster who poses riddles before granting passage, and who has the body half of a woman, half a lion, with wings of brass and gold feathers.

Traversing the Underworld becomes much easier, now that Jaskier has Renfri along. She casts light as other ghosts do, and she doubles as a superb bodyguard, which saves Jaskier’s hide numerous times. It turns out some ghosts are less human than others, _hungrier_ than others, and Renfri is able to disappear into shadows, quenching her light intentionally, the better to stalk the monstrous ghosts and cut them down. 

“These lot recognise you from when they saw you in life. Geralt vanquished them when you were in his company, didn’t he?”

“That’s right. Did they track us all the way here?” Jaskier had been a touch disappointed when his music hadn’t soothed their savagery, but Yennefer hadn’t been stammering when she told him to get help. _I suppose it was too much to hope, for it to be fairly safe down here. With the docile story-seeking ghosts, though, I thought… well, now I know better._

“No. They keep watch on the Witcher’s final rest, in the hope he will emerge so they can rend him to pieces. It’s a foolish hope; he never comes out, and he’s dour company, so he has few visitors of the friendly sort.”

“Wait, how long has he been down here, in Underworld time?”

“Oh, a good three months, I’d say. Why?”

“The sun still hasn’t set in the world above, on the day of his death.”

“Ah. Well, that does make me think better of you somewhat, Jaskier.”

“Oh?”

“You don’t waste time. I wish I’d known you in life; I think we could have been friends, and gods know I could have used a friend. I died when you were still in swaddling clothes, though.”

“Well, at least I’ve had this occasion to know you, however briefly. If I make it out of here alive with the Witcher-”

“When, Jaskier. When you make it out. It does you no good to have less than perfect conviction, down here.”

“ _When_ I make it out of here, I’ll sing of the warrior princess who aided me along the way.”

“That is certainly a pretty thought.” Renfri’s voice sounds sad. “And there are worse ways to be remembered.”

Renfri’s stealth and masterful swordfighting becomes crucially important then they arrive at an enormous iron gate, which happens to be guarded by a giant lion with metal wings and a face Jaskier is fairly certain he recognises, though it’s hard to tell by the leonine features sharing space with human ones. Regardless, he nearly mistakes her for a Manticore.

“Queen Calanthe?”

“I have heard your movements, Jaskier, and I am pleased that some still draw breath who remember my voice. I do not wish to oppose your mission, but I am part of the laws of this place. None may pass this gate without my leave,” the Sphinx intones, sounding hideously bored. 

“Your Majesty, if it would not be too much trouble… may I have your leave to pass this gate, please?” Jaskier performs a sweeping bow, pantomiming the doffing of a hat which he definitely isn’t wearing.

“You may not.” 

“In which case, how might one - hypothetically, of course - _obtain_ Your Majesty’s leave to pass this gate?”

“First, by solving a riddle.”

“Oh, well that’s not so bad.”

“Then by matching me in combat.”

“Ah. That could be a problem. I believe Your Majesty may be correct in saying that I may not have your leave to pass. I don’t suppose there are any alternative arrangements which might be pursued, instead of combat?”

The Sphinx rises to her feet and stretches her leonine form, yawning. Laying down, she was taller than a horse. Standing up, she’s taller than a _house._

“You know, bard, you’re the least boring thing to make noise down here since I died, and your songs are charming enough, but I really do miss fighting, and you don’t look fit to keep me entertained for more than a handful of heartbeats. The common shades are too insubstantial, and the Witcher refuses to depart from his moping, to face me. If you can get someone to champion your passage by dueling me, we’ll call that part square.”

Renfri steps forward from the shadows, coalescing into solidity. 

“Calanthe!” Renfri calls up to the towering lion-queen. “I am Renfri of Creyden, daughter of Fredefalk. In my life I admired your martial prowess, your ferocity, your many victories. Our destinies have crossed, though we never met in life, for I prophesied to the Witcher, Geralt of Rivia, that he would become the guardian of your granddaughter. It would be my pleasure and honour to duel you on this day, and many days to come.”

“Well said,” Calanthe purrs, unsheathing her claws and lashing her tail. The metal feathers of her wings scrape loudly against each other, ear-splitting. Renfri drops into a ready pose, her blade-arms oozing darkness and concealing her footwork. “Bard, here is your riddle!” Calanthe shouts, a roar that makes the cavern shudder. “What flows as a river but rests as a stone? What bleeds without heartbeat or marrow or bone, always all one but never alone?”

Renfri leaps forward at the Sphinx, and Jasier dodges backward, slipping on the slick cave floor. He lands hard on his ass, and as he pulls himself to his feet, his hands brush against several smooth blobs of solidified sap. He holds one up, his hands looking bloody with it, his blue livery now thoroughly dyed red, from scarlet doublet to ruby slippers.

“A perilous treasure, the rarest I’ve known: Calanthe’s cold crown and Renfri’s red throne. The answer to Your Majesty’s riddle is the sap of the Sovereign Tree, which flows in its trunk and congeals into solid amber. It all comes from one source, but falls as uncountably many bloody droplets from the cavern ceiling.”

“You may pass,” Calanthe bellows. “Open, gate! Admit the bard who has brought me such sport!”

Jaskier stumbles toward the wrought iron cemetery gate, needing momentarily to sprint to pass between the vast monster’s clawed feet. As he passes through, he glances behind him to see, with some shock, that Renfri isn’t merely holding her own; she’s taken initiative and is pressing the advantage, driving the Queen backward into a crosswise tunnel.

“Go on without me!” Renfri shouts. “We’ll be awhile. I’ll catch up with you later.” She seems vital, gleeful, entirely unworried and unhurried, springing up to dodge swiping paws, landing with such easy lightness that she might as well be made of feathers or straw, and not flesh. A pang strikes Jaskier, of wishing he’d had enough time to ask for her story. Maybe Geralt will know it.

Jasier steps through the gate and into what appears to be a very unkempt tavern.


	8. Chapter 7: Lethe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lethe: The river in the Underworld, which has waters that make the drinker forget their mortal life

Jaskier recognises this tavern as the one where he first encountered Geralt. The chairs are placed upon the tables with their feet in the air, as though the proprietor has closed business for the night to begin cleanup. A banked fire hisses softly in a wide hearth, beneath a cauldron of perpetual stew, which from its odor has remained perpetual, but would now be challenging to define as _stew._

“I daresay this place has seen better days.” Jaskier sneezes violently as clouds of dust kick up from his footsteps. “For pity’s sake, does nobody down here own a feather duster?” 

Jaskier nearly doesn’t notice the Witcher at his corner table, despite that being the first place the bard looks for him. The large man seems folded in on himself somehow, his face turned down and staring into a mug of some drink, and a sheer clinging film of some sort, like old spiderwebs with the gossamer sheen of dragonflies’ wings, covers the Witcher from crown to toe, reminding Jaskier of the way an early frost clings to fruit before the harvest. The image charms him, and he strums idly at his lute, testing chords and syllables to find the right tune, the right vowel harmonies. 

_There I found the Witcher, oh, the friend whom I had lost,  
Awaiting me in a derelict tavern,  
Away from foes in an underworld cavern,  
Rimed in fine Hell-Frost._

Geralt looks up sharply in Jaskier’s direction, though not precisely at Jaskier. 

“Sorry; didn’t mean to startle you,” Jaskier remarks, walking up to Geralt and plunking himself into the chair opposite. “Hadn’t figured you for the kind who can be snuck upon, Geralt; are you getting complacent in your old age?” 

A long beat passes, and Geralt is still staring at the spot where Jaskier stood a moment ago. He looks back down into his drink - rather, his mug, as Jaskier notes it is empty. 

“What, no hello for your best friend? No ‘how are you doing, Jaskier?’ No,’what’s a nice bard like you doing in a shithole like this?’ No ‘hmn?’” 

Geralt doesn’t react, and Jaskier begins to worry. He finds it remarkable that he _begins_ to worry, because it implies that he has, at any point throughout the process, _stopped_ worrying. Jaskier reaches across the table to tap the back of Geralt’s hand, and upon discovering his own hand passes straight through Geralt’s, he reels away with such force that he falls off his chair.

Geralt looks up again, rises from his own seat, reaches down to the chair Jaskier had been inhabiting, and sets it upright.

“Fucking noisy ghosts,” Geralt huffs. “I thought you were done rattling the furniture a month ago. Leave me alone.”

“Right,” Jaskier notes aloud, “so you can’t see, touch, or hear me talking, but you can interact with solid objects that aren’t me, which I can also interact with. Let’s see if there’s anything to the stories, shall we?”

Jaskier pulls a gold coin out of his pocket and tosses it so it lands on the table in front of Geralt, spinning loudly on its edge before tipping onto its side. Geralt looks down at the coin like he’s seen a ghost.

_Well, to be more accurate, he looks like how other people look when they see ghosts,_ Jaskier thinks. _He seems not to mind actually seeing actual ghosts._

Geralt picks up the coin, holding it in the dim false sunlight slanting through the adjacent window, examining it. Heartened, Jaskier starts strumming his lute again.

“This tune seemed popular earlier, so let’s try it again here.”

_I fell from above, sent to find a friend,  
a legend, a Witcher, true to the end.  
I’ve found my friend Geralt, oh cavern of ghosties, oh cavern of ghosties!_

Jaskier had not thought Geralt could go paler than he’d been already, but Geralt blanches to the point of looking nauseated.

“I did not expect death to be kind,” the Witcher speaks slowly, biting off each syllable in a pained, furious voice, “but this is cruelty, mocking what I have left behind. Be on your way, whatever you are. You may not be the last to haunt me, but you are also not the first. There is no sport for you here, in tormenting me. However you feel I wronged you in life, it is in the past, and this is not a place for atonement.”

Jaskier is now properly annoyed, albeit in a sympathetic sort of way. He isn’t certain if he’s annoyed at Geralt for being _a bit thick_ right now, or if he’s more annoyed at whatever haunting has left Geralt in such a state, but the matter _will not stand!_

_Do you not know your own bard when he plays?  
What other voice decorated your days?  
You’re wounding Jaskier with your unbelief!  
Will you leave me all alone with my grief?  
Witcher they call you, but I name you Thief!_

“Very well, noisy ghost, are we to have a battle of words, since you can find no other way to harm me here, any more than I can see or touch you? Fine. You sound nothing like Jaskier; if he were here, he’d mock you soundly, so I’ll have to do it in his place. Your singing is a bit pitchy, like you’re getting over a cold, and your lute needs tuning.”

Jaskier lets out an indignant squawk, then furiously sets about checking his tuning. 

“Pitchy, my lily-white arse, you grumpy, grouchy, recalcitrant frost-covered git! If you want to aim below the belt, then avast and have at ye!”

_Yennefer, sorrowing surely -_

“She’ll live.”

_Dare not delude yourself: she won’t forgive.  
Burdened, abandoned, be-widowed, bereft!  
Geralt, consider the size of your theft:  
bard, horse, and heartbroken child are what’s left._

“‘Be-widowed’ isn’t a word; you’ve mixed it up with ‘bewildered.’ It’s just ‘widowed.’ And your prosody is a mess; you started the last line on a spondee instead of a trochee.”

“Hah! I knew you read my treatise on scansion! ‘Pie with no filling,’ you big liar.”

Geralt, for all his biting words, shifts in his seat in visible discomfort, and Jaskier goes for the throat.

“Now that I _know_ I have your attention:”

_What of Cirilla, your Child of Surprise?  
Can’t you imagine the hurt in her eyes?  
You are what’s promised and Destiny-bound.  
Will you sleep soundly here under the ground,  
having thrice-orphaned the foundling you found?_

“ENOUGH,” Geralt bellows, just as Jaskier starts into a verse about Roach. “You’ve tested my patience and had your fun. Get out, and watch that nothing eats you as you pass the gate.”

“Ah, it seems our bard is having little luck,” a familiar low voice intones from the tavern door. Jaskier turns to see Calanthe - not the Sphinx, but Calanthe recognisably herself - standing there with Renfri, an arm slung around the younger woman’s shoulders. They’re both soaked in blood - or perhaps it’s the Sovereign Tree’s sap? - and they seem in high spirits. 

“I’m afraid so, Your Majesty,” Jaskier replies, crossing the room to meet them. “So far as I can tell, he can’t detect I’m here unless I’m singing or moving furniture around, and it sounds like he’s been suffering some sort of haunting, and now mistakes me for more of the same. Do you know what might be going on here?”

Renfri offers Jaskier a sad smile. “You see the bright film covering him? Though it may seem otherwise, there is not only one afterlife, and the Witcher inhabits a different one from regular mortals. Witchers and sorcerors, on account of their exceedingly long lifespans, do not rejoin the cycle of incarnation that nonmagical mortals experience. When they die, not only do they remain in the Otherworld far longer - perhaps forever, though I will not swear to it, having not yet seen eternity fulfilled any more than you have - but they exist in a separate layer of plane of awareness from the rest of us. We can see them, and some of our movements can affect them, but they cannot observe us directly. They only have others with a similar fate, with whom to communicate and pass the time.”

“Ah,” Jaskier eloquently responds. 

“And your friend there, well…” Calanthe lets out a hoarse laugh. “He is hardly winning any popularity contests, either in his former life or down here. It’s made him something of a curiosity. The dead are usually lonely and seek the company of others from their living memory. Geralt of Rivia, though? He shuts himself up in this ratty simulacrum of a pub, and the only company he keeps is the occasional haunting that slips by while I’m napping.”

“Your Majesty takes naps? Isn’t that redundant for a dead person?” 

“Quite the opposite,” Calanthe replies. “A monarch enjoys little opportunity to sleep deeply, in life. Down here, it has become a favoured pastime. The rest of the time, I guard the gate to Geralt’s retreat, because that is the best way to find any sport. He has many enemies, many creatures he sent down here with his own hands, many human lives he was too late to save, and who blame him for their death. Some of these foes make for decent entertainment, as my other favoured pastime is fighting, and here I need not fear dying yet again.”

“So… Your Majesty guards the gate because Geralt is bait for the ghosts of vengeful ghoulies, ghosties, long-leggedy beasties, and things that go bump in the night?”

“Exactly. Princess Renfri remains the best to come this way, but on occasion I can count on a Chimaera or the occasional Hydra, and that’s much better than spending every waking hour bored off my tits.”

“Why the riddle, then?”

“Oh, I just felt like fucking with you, and you seemed to need it. You came down here looking so _serious_ and like you were about to shit yourself in terror, so I thought I’d throw you a bone, a problem you’d know how to solve.”

“So Your Majesty posed a riddle to me… to _boost my confidence?_ ” Jaskier looks aghast, clutching his lute to his chest defensively.

“Well, yes. That, and a Sphinx has a lioness’ sense of smell, and if you actually had shat yourself, I’d be dealing with the reek for weeks after you left.” 

“We’ve gone off topic,” Renfri cuts in. “To the matter at hand: Jaskier, you mean to get your Witcher out of here somehow, yes? We need to make a way for you to get through to him. If we had a pen and paper, it would be easier-”

“It wouldn’t,” Jaskier says. “Paper won’t convince him when he’s in such a state. He called me _pitchy_ , can you believe? The nerve.” Renfri and Calanthe exchange a look, before Renfri continues.

“In any case, all we really need to do is find someone with the same magic-touched afterlife as Geralt, and persuade them to help us. I’m afraid I can’t be much help about it; every conjurer I ever met tried to kill me. What about you, Cintra?”

“Oh, I know one. I even know he’ll help us readily. I just won’t swear the Witcher will listen, since he was the very first person the Witcher turned away upon arriving here. Creyden, will you stay here to guard Jaskier while I go get him? With nobody minding the gate, this pub may well turn into a bloodbath in a short order.”

“Really, now,” Renfri smiles, and the blades at the ends of her arms gleam wetly with iridescent bloody shadows. “You should know better than to threaten me with a good time.”

Calanthe steps out of the pub, and no sooner has the door shut, than he hears a leonine roar, several minutes of audible sharpness and spilling viscera, and one particularly unpleasant snap of bone, before the noise dies down, replaced only with Calanthe’s gleeful cackle, fading into the distance as she goes to bring back someone to help.

She returns an hour later with a druid. At least, Jaskier’s pretty sure he’s a druid. The man’s body is made of copper and tin from the neck down, a black and green patina turning the overall image motley, the only brightness coming from a shimmering hoarfrost that covers every inch of him. 

“He was killed by a Doppler,” Calanthe explains as she leads Mousesack into the tavern. “When one dies by violence, their form in the afterlife changes to reflect what it would have taken to avoid death. If his body had been metal rather than flesh, the Doppler could not have completed the task.”

“I had my sword taken from my hand,” Renfri adds, “so now I cannot be deprived of my blades at all. As for Cintra here,” Renfri nods toward Calanthe, “if she’d been the lioness they called her, or if she could fly away, or if she had the mighty roar of her daughter and granddaughter…”

“Any of these things could have saved me the day my kingdom fell,” Calanthe finishes.

“What about Geralt, then?” Jaskier asks. “He died by violence. I don’t see any extra metal plating on his belly.”

“Witchers are different, I think,” Renfri responds. “Their lives are defined by violence, so dying violently is just the natural end of their lifespan, no matter how it happens. The only thing that could have spared him, was living a different life entirely, or being a touch more skillful a Witcher in that specific battle. But then… “ Renfri squints at Jaskier, and for a shivery moment he finds her terribly uncanny, before she brightens. “Oh, that makes sense. He died willingly to save you. The only thing that could have spared him, would be placing less value on your life. That isn’t something the Otherworld can change about a person, so of course he’s unaltered now that he’s here.”

While the three speak, the druid Mousesack walks over to Geralt and takes a seat at his table. 

“I may be misreading the signs, but unless I am mistaken, I have been given orders to tell you to start listening to your noisy ghost.”

Geralt scowls but doesn’t look up.

“Say, Your Majesty…”

“Yes, bard?”

“How did Your Majesty get Mousesack to come this way, if their sort can’t see our sort?”

“I wrote it in blood and tree sap on the cavern wall.”

“Ah. That would do it.”


	9. Chapter 8: Psychopompos

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Psychopompos: An entity who carries mortal souls into the afterlife, and escorts them through their dreams as they sleep.

Jaskier waits for something, anything, to happen. _This is the part of the story where things start looking up, isn’t it?_ But Geralt stares into his empty tankard of ghost-ale and Mousesack stares at Geralt, and Calanthe’s whippy tail keeps materialising whenever he glances away, smacking Jaskier, vanishing when he turns to look, and he’s starting to suspect it’s intentional. Renfri’s eyes are black with hunger again, and this is just the shittiest sort of fairy story Jaskier’s ever lived through. _Assuming I live through it._

“Are you going to _sit there all day?”_

But of course, Mousesack can’t exactly hear him any more than Geralt can. Jaskier plucks an irritated note from his lute and it hovers in the air, inexplicably, like the glare of a sturdy innkeep you can’t see, but know is eyeing you from across the room and looking for a reason to throw your ass into the snow. 

“Your ghostie is getting impatient,” Mousesack says, with a hint of a smile.

“Isn’t my ghostie,” Geralt says with a shrug. “Just some shitty wight trailing my heels and badly copying the bard’s voice.”

“Badly? _Badly?_ ” Of their own accord, Jaskier’s fingers hit the lute strings again, and though it isn’t the worst chord he’s ever played, both Mousesack and Geralt flinch like he’s struck them. Jaskier files that away to panic about later. 

Mousesack leans over enough to peer into Geralt’s tankard and winces at whatever he sees there. 

“Even dead, you have no taste,” he says, wrinkling his nose. “Empty, sure, but I can tell by the residue what was in it. If you’re going to lock yourself away in a tavern, shouldn’t you at least pick something palatable?” 

“Go find some breadcrumbs to rattle about, druid.” Geralt glares at him, but Jaskier, having been subjected to so many of those glares, he’s _fluent_ in them, doesn’t feel the heat in it. It finally dawns on him that Geralt truly is a shade here, and it has nothing to do with being dead, and everything to do with being _empty._ Purposeless, directionless. He is… he’s lacking that fire, that spark that _makes him_ Geralt. No venom, no steel, no thrice-damned _hmms._ None of that carefully hidden playful streak that only comes out around Yen and Ciri and Roach and Jaskier. 

Jasker’s heart breaks in his chest, and the sound echoes out from the lute in his hands, slow and mournful, notes scattering across the tavern’s filthy floor like tears. 

Geralt whips round, staring in the direction of the music as if he can see Jaskier standing there pouring heartbreak out for the whole bloody Underworld to see. Sounds from beyond the tavern slither through the door, distant sobs and sighs and whispers of grieving; Jaskier faithfully works them into the song, winding them into the chorus until it seems the very air around them shudders and weeps. 

“ _Jaskier_?”

“You can’t see him,” Mousesack says gently, laying his hand on Geralt’s. “Nor can I, before you ask.” 

Still, Geralt’s eyes dart over the tavern, bare on his side of death even as Jaskier and Calanthe and Renfri stand amongst the dusty tables and empty chairs. “How -”

“Your Dandelion is still an average mortal, for all the stupid bravery that brought him here.” Mousesack opens his hand and a tankard zooms into it from the bar, sloshing an ale redder than blood across the table. “You and I, old friend, are not. We are separate in death as we were in life, set apart by blood and magic and deed.” The druid frowns as he lifts the drink to his mouth, then pauses. “Bard, I hope you haven’t partaken of the Underworld’s hospitality. A shame for you to come so far only to lose yourself for want of a drink.” 

Something like indignation burns in Jaskier’s throat. “Do you think -” _Right._ Mousesack can’t hear him speak. “Does he think I’m stupid?” he asks, rather pointlessly. Renfri laughs in her raw, torn-throat way, and even Calanthe huffs in amusement. “Right. Don’t answer that, either of you.” Jaskier pulls together the introductory cadence of _The Fishmonger’s Daughter_ , warping the lyrics to be topical.

_Oh spellmonger, oh spellmonger,  
I would not quell my hunger  
To dine with the dead  
On your bloody ale and bread,_

_For the stories all say  
To eat is to stay  
In this cavern of dread.  
I’m peckish instead,  
Singing and playing all day, hey, ho._

Geralt exchanges a look with Mousesack, then runs his hands over his face, sighing. 

“So. Jaskier is really here.” 

“‘Twould seem so,” Mousesack says, muffled by the tankard. “Hardly surprising; he loves you far more than himself.”

Jaskier winces, huffs a breath, and pushes that obviously false statement to the side to sulk over later. For now, he has to concentrate on getting Geralt _out of here._ How long he’s been here is anyone’s guess, and it’d be the worst luck if the time flow decided to reverse, slowing its progress here while speeding up on the side of the living. Has he been here an hour? A week? It’s certainly felt like a lifetime, with the rapid progress through grief’s stages, but he’s confident that he hasn’t been here quite _that_ long. 

“What does he expect to come of this? Does he propose to free me from death’s clutches, then?” There is anger threaded through Geralt’s voice, sure as Yen had predicted. “I assume Yennefer has something to do with this. This is exactly the kind of reckless chaos she revels in.”

Jaskier looks to his escorts. “I don’t suppose either of you know how to sum up ‘well, there’s this really big Underworld tree up top a volcano, and my heartbeat went into it, so I’m not really alive nor really dead, and also Yen is waiting for us, so get your ass out of your head; it’s not a cap?’ I haven’t yet figured out how to rhyme ‘volcano,’ you see. Oh, wait, ‘volcanic’ rhymes with ‘panic;’ I bet I can-” 

He doesn’t really expect an answer, but midway through Jaskier musing aloud, “Manic, titanic, frantic, tantric? No…” Renfri steps forward. Though neither man at the table can see her, both tense, as though sensing her approach. She hesitates, eyes fluttering shut, before the tip of her right blade rests against the dusty wood. More delicately than Jaskier thought possible, Renfri carves the unmistakable shape of the Sovereign Tree, replete with its six-petal blooms, amidst the curving suggestion of a caldera. 

“Ah,” Mousesack says softly. “Your loves are brave indeed.” The slight awe in his voice skims ice down Jaskier’s back, but it’s far too late to back out. He plunged into this, damn the consequences, and with Geralt in front of him, with progress laying its golden bricks at his feet, he _will_ see this through. 

“It’s a tree.” 

Mousesack scoffs, but the reprimand is too soft to sting. “This isn’t _a_ tree. This is _the_ tree. The Sovereign Tree. If the border between life and death has a marker, it’s this tree. If there is a pin which keeps Destiny confined to the parchment of the world, so it can’t flutter off on a whim like a moth toward a candle, carrying all of us with it to simultaneous doom, it’s this tree.” He runs a hand through his gray hair. “Bard, you and the witch are either foolishly confident, or _completely mad._ No one bargains with the Tree lightly.”

The table between them creaks under Geralt’s hand, but he makes no other sound.

“The way the Tree works,” Mousesack continues, summoning bits and bobs from the tavern around them, “is this: If this bowl is the Tree’s nest, and this plate is the Underworld gate, then Jaskier dove through the river of fire--” He mimes dropping a spoon into the bowl before actually dropping it on the plate. “And landed here.”

“Yes!” Two strong, encouraging notes ring out under Jaskier’s fingers. “A fine explanation, if lacking the terror of being shoved head first into magma.” 

Geralt grunts, and _yes,_ finally, some of himself must be returning, because Jaskier _knows_ that particular grumpy noise. If his music could summon buttercup yellow sunshine and happily tweeting birdies, he absolutely would. He settles for another encouraging chord, instead, to backdrop Mousesack’s growing excitement.

“The theory goes, if a spirit is willing to traverse the length of the Underworld and all its dangers, he’s granted the grace to return to the living with the one he loves.” The druid’s metal fingers clack on the table. “But this spellwork is… _impossible,_ no one has actually succeeded in it.” 

“Yen specialises in the impossible,” Geralt growls, “and usually drags everyone else in with her.” 

“Shoves, actually,” Jaskier says again, ignoring Calanthe’s noise of amusement behind him.

Geralt shoves himself to his feet, swipes his tangled hair out of his face, and Jaskier longs to wipe the hell-frost from him. The moment they step foot back across the caldera, he decides, he and Yen are taking Geralt and lavishing care on him. “This doesn’t explain how I’m coming back to life. Or where.” 

Mousesack shrugs, a delighted spark in his silver eyes. “All directions are north, from the southern pole of the world. All directions from death lead to life. As long as your witch is holding the door open on Life’s side, and you do not get separated from your bard, it does not matter which direction you walk; it will be _away_ from death.”

**Author's Note:**

> Premise credit goes to the tumblr user voidofthestars, found in their post here: https://voidofthestars.tumblr.com/post/190325368652  
> "I'm craving a hades persephone witcher au yall
> 
> no other ship truly captures the essence of that au the way geralt/jaskier does and I'll die on this hill"
> 
> Source material credit goes to the creators of The Witcher franchise in its entirety, and to Virgil, Ovid, Boethius, Apollodorus, and a number of other ancient Greek and Roman poets and folklorists, who wrote these myths down so we might enjoy them thousands of years later.
> 
> Title credit goes to J.R.R. Tolkien, whose relationship between Frodo and Samwise will always exist at the fore of all my standards for how to depict relationships of devotion and hope that reaches beyond despair and doom.
> 
> Beta-reading credit goes to sanderidge.
> 
> Credit for all manner of mistakes, out-of-character moments, fumbling, and folly, go to Istrael, and I'll accept some credit as well for the occasional cleverness.


End file.
